Star-dust in Hollywood (1930)

Chapter XVI HOLLYWOOD— THE MADNESS OF MOVIETONE r\ /| 0 E had brought an introduction to a supervisor of v J X J supervisors, one of the highest ranks possible to a man not a gold-plated magnate. He invited us to lunch and, leaning toward us over the salad with an attitude of secret confidence, said impressively : "I'm now going to tell you what is wrong with the movies." At that moment an almost equally important star came into the restaurant, and the explanation was temporarily postponed. We dined with Sam Ornitz, and at the subsequent party a supervisor, rather less important, coaxed me into a corner. Waving his glass of whisky and ginger ale before my face, he said impressively : " I'm going to tell you what is wrong with the movies." But an ambitious young woman cut him from under my guns, and the analysis of movie decadence was left untold. We watched the university professor, dressed as a fortyniner, careering drunkenly about in a Wild West saloon. He came from the set, and, crouching before me in an almost menacing manner — the six-shooter illusion still haunting him off the stage — he growled : " I'll tell you now what is wrong with the movies." But the whistle called him off once more to caper under the Kleigs and suns. In fact, the whole of Hollywood seemed to be almost unanimously of opinion that the movies were sick. Stars still received ^2000 and ^3000 a week. Directors still turned [268]